


Cold

by swimmiNgDiNosauR



Series: Melinda May and Jemma Simmons [1]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Cold, F/F, Hypothermia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-07
Updated: 2018-06-07
Packaged: 2019-05-19 07:09:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14869077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/swimmiNgDiNosauR/pseuds/swimmiNgDiNosauR
Summary: Melinda gets caught in a storm after a failed mission.





	Cold

She hadn’t meant to crash the car. She hadn’t meant to crash it into a river. She _definitely_ hadn’t meant to stay in the river for almost over an hour whilst she hid from the men tailing her.

The freezing wind barges through her jacket, past the fabric her soaking T-shirt which clings to her skin, and seeps into her skin, chilling her to the bone. The sky has darkened even though it’s barely two in the afternoon, the storm clouds pouring rain on everything. The howling wind ices her clothes dry, just for the rain to wet them instantly. Her day has gone from bad to worse. Her sodden clothes can’t dry and she can’t stay in this weather for much longer without getting hypothermia.

She can’t feel her trembling fingers but she knows they’re cold because they’ve gone purple. She’s willing to bet her lips are blue. She pulls her jacket tighter around her and stuffs her hands in her armpits in a desperate attempt. Her feet have long since gone numb but she keeps forcing herself to plant one foot in front of the other, however slowly. The wind drives her back, great gusts of it nearly sweeping her off her feet. The rain continues to bucket down, blinding her. She wipes her eyes clumsily and regrets it as her hands burn sharply.

She stumbles along the muddy road, praying for a car to drive past. There’s a ditch beside her and she doesn’t want to think about what would happen if she fell over. She’s already tripped and her knees are stinging, jeans ripped. Her side is on fire. She’s not sure what happened. She can’t remember what happened after she lost control of the car when one of the tyres was shot. Everything from then on is a jumbled blur; the windows shattering, the icy water, the pain in her side.

She spots a pair of headlights in the distance and feels a smile crawl onto her face for the first time since this morning. Coulson had told her it would be a simple mission, just go in, break a few noses, get the files and out. It hadn’t been simple from the start. They had somehow known she was coming and from the minute she walked into the building to the minute she ran out, stealing a car, they knew who she was and why she had come. She _hates_ recon missions. She’s never going again. Coulson can take his ‘best friend for thirty years, please, Mel,’ crap and shove it up his ass.

She swears again when the heavens open and sleet comes crashing down. With the sleet comes hail and it pounds on the ground in front of her, bouncing. She ducks her head and tries to avoid the worst of it.

The car approaches quickly and she just has time to jump out of the way before it runs her over. She glares at the sky from her position in the ditch, mud on her face, knees and hands. She tries to get up, slips, and gets mud on the front of her clothes.

Melinda swears loudly, angrily. She crawls back up to the road with some difficulty and continues walking in the direction of New York. From there, she can find a payphone and call Jemma. A smile graces her face. Jemma. She misses her, even if she forces her into the Med Bay when she’s perfectly fine.

Fifteen minutes later, and about fifty metres of distance from where she fell into the ditch, and a whole lot cleaner thanks to the rain, another car approaches behind her. It’s headlights burn her retinas and she looks forward again quickly, moving to the side of the road in case it’s another careless driver. The car slows and the driver winds down the window.

The driver is a woman, about thirty, with frizzy red hair and concerned brown eyes. Her pale skin is dotted with freckles. She’s wearing a thick jacket and a woolly scarf wrapped tightly around her neck. The heater is up on full blast. There’s no one else in the car.

“Are you alright?” the woman asks, leaning out of the window.

Melinda can’t make herself move. She tries to make her voice work, tries to ask if she could have a lift back.

“What’s your name?” the woman asks.

Melinda makes a noise and the woman winces.

“C’mon, get in,” she says, getting out and helping Melinda around to the other side, shivering. “God, it’s cold out here. What were you doing?” She opens the door and guides her to the seat. Melinda’s hands bump the seatbelt around uselessly. The woman buckles her up and shuts the door, hurrying around to her seat. She slams her door shut and pulls out onto the road.

“Th-th… Th…” Melinda can’t get the rest of the word out, her voice failing her.

The woman smiles. “I’m Penny. What’s your name?”

“Mmm… Mmmelll,” she manages.

“Mel? Short for anything? Melinda? Melody?” Penny guesses. She turns the heating up all the way to the top and glances across at the woman. She’s not shivering. That’s probably not good. She must be too numb to feel the cold.

“Mmmelll… L-l-linn… D… Da,” she stammers, holding her hands in front of the heater.

“Well, Melinda, where are you going?” Penny asks and then realises that Melinda can barely answer simple questions like her name, let alone where she’s going. She rummages around in the back of her seat until she pulls out a map. She hands it to the woman who takes it with some difficulty. “Just point. I’ll drop you off. Is there anyone you want to call?”

Call. Jemma. She can call Jemma. She nods gratefully, slowly. Her head feels heavy.

Penny hands her the phone, unlocking it. “Just type the number in. If you can’t and you need to say it for me, I can pull over and we can do that.”

With shaking hands, Melinda types in Jemma’s number. She doesn’t pick up until the fifth ring.

“Hello?” Jemma says. “Who is this?”

“Jjjj… J-j-jemmm,” Melinda stumbles over the name.

“Melinda?” Jemma instantly sounds on edge. “Are you alright? Where are you?”

“C-c-colll… C-c-colll… Dd,” she stutters.

“You’re supposed to be back by now,” Jemma says like she doesn’t already know. “What happened?”

“T-t-t-trrra… Accce,” she gets out.

“Trace your call? Melinda, what’s going on?” Jemma sounds terrified. “Are you okay?”

Melinda’s sorry for causing Jemma so much fear but she can’t get the words out. “P-p-pll… P-pllea… Sse.”

“Okay,” Jemma agrees. “I’ll trace your call. We’ll pick you up from there, okay? But when you get back, we’re going to be talking about your communication skills.”

“Y-y-yessss.” As of late, she hasn’t been the best at talking but right now isn’t her fault. It’s mostly Coulson’s. She’s going to kill him for this stunt.

She opens the map book with trembling hands and finds New York City. She points to it and Penny grins.

“I’m going there too. Got a business conference,” she explains.

Penny talks and Melinda lets it wash over her. It’s soothing. Her bones warm up as the car travels along the road. When Penny pulls over outside a shopping centre, she thanks her profusely, still stammering. The wind batters her the minute she gets out of the car.

“You’ll be all right?” Penny asks, looking worried.

Melinda nods and forces a smile on her face that she hopes looks realistic. Her team’s coming to pick her up. She’ll be fine.

Penny zooms out into the stream of traffic and Melinda watches her go until she can’t see her anymore. Then she stumbles over to the wall of the mall and swears. She presses a hand against her side and before the rain washes it away, she sees red. She groans and takes a step in the direction of the Playground. It takes her ten minutes just to make it down the street, which is about thirty-five metres long.

She regrets telling Jemma to trace the phone because Penny’s gone, speeding off into traffic. She drops her head and staggers towards the Playground. She’s about an hours walk away.

It takes her three and a half hours and by the time she reaches the base, she’s too tired to ask for permission to enter, instead just walking in, overriding the security. She staggers towards the common room, passing the lab and looking in with the hope of finding Jemma.

She leans against the wall of the common room and hears Jemma arguing with Coulson. She smiles, letting her head fall back against the wall and musters up the effort to walk into the common room. She does her best to not look like she’s drunk but she’s pretty sure she almost fell over onto Hunter.

“J-J-Jem,” she stutters, her teeth chattering loudly.

Jemma looks over in annoyance but her face clears as she sees who it is.

“Melinda! Are you okay? What happened?” She rushes over and barrages her girlfriend with a whole load of questions. Melinda collapsed on her, wrapping her frozen arms around her. When she pulls back, there’s a wet patch on Jemma’s clothes.

She sways slightly, standing stiffly. Jemma takes note of the way Melinda stands carefully, keeping most of her weight off her right side. Melinda’s hair is plastered to her face and back, her clothes clinging tightly to her body and her jacket weighing her down, dripping water onto the floor. Her arms are pressed tightly around her.

“Melinda,” Coulson says in astonishment. “What happened to you?”

Melinda gives him the best sour look she can manage. He’s the reason she’s in this position in the first place.

Jemma helps Melinda over to the fire. Elena and Bobbi are sitting on the couch playing cards, their guns beside them. Bobbi stands up, looking over in concern. “Is she okay?” she asks.

“Frozen,” Jemma says, “Possible hypothermia.”

She leads Melinda over to the fire and sits her in front of it. She peels Melinda’s jacket off and dumps it on the floor behind her.

“Arms up,” Jemma says gently.

Melinda shifts her arms in her lap but she can’t lift them. Jemma rolls Melinda’s T-shirt up, pulling it over her head and dumping it with the jacket. She notes the gunshot wound and frowns. It’s not bleeding as much anymore, just a little bit now and then, and the blood has almost scabbed over. She stripped Melinda of her socks and shoes, pouring the water into the sink.

“Can you stand?” Jemma asks.

Melinda nods, teeth chattering loudly. She falls back to the floor the first time she tries. Coulson comes over and steadies her while Jemma unbuttons her jeans and yanks them down.

When her sodden clothes have been discarded except her underwear and she’s wrapped in a blanket, sitting by the fire, curled up to Jemma, she starts shivering. Her whole body trembles as the feeling comes back to her and the cold sets in.

“How about a shower?” Bobbi suggests. When she was twenty-three, she was caught in a storm and she had tried to sit in front of a fire before her partner had pulled her into the shower.

Jemma nods and murmurs something to Melinda who makes a pained noise. She stands and holds out a hand to her. Melinda takes it and pulls herself up, gripping her blanket tightly. Bobbi comes over and scoops the smaller woman up. Melinda presses closer against her, trying to fight away the cold.

Jemma turns the water on cold and Bobbi sets Melinda down, unwrapping her from the blanket. They help her into the shower and she hisses and jerks away. Bobbi catches her before she can fall over.

“Too cold?” Jemma asks, reaching to turn the heat up.

Melinda shakes her head. “T-t-to h-hot.”

Bobbi frowns and puts her hand under the spray, testing the heat. She pulls her hand away almost immediately, the cold water freezing her. Jemma turns the water colder and Melinda dips her toe into it cautiously. She winces but stays under the water until it starts to get colder. She fumbles with the tap but Bobbi reaches in and does it for her. She leans against the wall, letting the cold water that feels warm run over her skin, trying not to wince when the water hits her wound.

When Melinda’s lips are no longer blue and her hands have stopped shaking and the water is lukewarm, she turns the tap off and turns to face Jemma, shivering as the cold air dries on her skin. Bobbi wraps a towel around her and dries her off.

“Jemma,” she gets out, a little croakily as she hasn’t used her voice properly for some time. “Ow.”

Jemma’s eyes widen and she pulls Melinda towards the Med Bay. The bullet is still inside her, lodged beside her stomach. It’s pure luck that it hasn’t pierced the organ and released gastric acid into her bloodstream.

Melinda groans as Jemma slices her skin with a scalpel to give her some room to poke the tweezers into. Her fists clench as Jemma digs into her and pulls the bullet out. Jemma stitches the hole up and strokes Melinda’s hair.

“Sorry I couldn’t give you an anaesthetic. We don’t have much left,” she says in apology.

“’S okay,” Melinda mumbles, tilting her head up and pulling Jemma down for a kiss.

Jemma smiles against her mouth. She pulls back. “I love you. Even though you called me when you couldn’t even speak and then asked me to trace the call, without saying where you were getting out.”

Melinda frowns at her. “I tried.”

Jemma smiles. “I know you did, Mel. You did your best.”

Melinda smiles.

 

“Although you probably could have called me earlier.”


End file.
